Charlemagnes Price
by LofCharlemagne
Summary: An American superhero named Charlemagne leads a revolution to change the government, but the American General Voltaire reminds him that nothing in life comes without a cost.


There was something about all of this...this...insanity that drives a man to come out of the darkness that surrounds him. But even when he swings the hardest, no blow could even compare to the massive tidal wave they call the US Army. Hell, a tidal wave would seem mighty pleasant compared to these men. If you thought mowing a lawn was repetitively boring, try fighting a mosh pit of walking tanks...no wait...DON'T try that. Ever.

You see, men like that really don't care what they have to do, only that they can get the job done. And that's what she tried to convince me to see. She knew me, my head may as well have been filled with loose rocks, because nothing she said got through to me. Oh sure, I can take a few men armed with heat seeking bullets and trajectory paths...no problem! I realized how stupid it was far too late.

We were up late the night before that, running through the empty caverns, yelling each others names and seeing how long we could hear the echos. 'Damien!' she would yell, and her voice carried for what seemed like eternity. It was so smooth, so caring, even as she told me not to leave. It's like creamy chocolate really, hearing a gentle woman's voice carry through the night. It's especially touching when that same voice is calling out for you, wrapping its arms around your all so eager soul.

Somedays you just long to hear it, and even when its silent, it's still there, reminding you that her caressing love knows no bounds.

'To arms' is a cry that comes with a cost. Not the kind of cost that requires you to pay taxes, or throw some damn quarters at a man who claims to give it back to you one day. No. I mean a bloody penalty, something that you can actually lose.

We would all take a gamble on what the cost we would be. Cap'n thought it would be something simple, like devotion to a cause.

Devotion is like a penny...you can only toss it at someone so many times until you either lose it or it gets thrown back at your sorry ass.

Cap'n was wrong. A real cost...costs..more then any physical material can comprehend.

I remember the faces...I remember the screams, the bloodshed, the full understanding of what it means to pay.

There they were, one in each arm, suffocating half to death, trying to spit the blood out of their lungs. One of them tried to speak, maybe just a mere syllable, but it was enough to know that they were my price.

Devotion is throwing pennies in the Atlantic ocean...

...But separation...now that's a price to pay.

They didn't get a funeral. Who would come anyways? I guess you could say that the burned down house served as some form of demented burial ground.

Maybe at least one of the thorn bushes could pop out of the rubble in such a way as to make it look like some sort of flower was there.

She would always ask me where they were, even though we both knew full well. Occasionally I would grab an old blanket and throw it over a pile of stones, claiming that they were underneath it, taking a quiet nap.

She always liked to think of it as beauty sleep. Just think of how beautiful they will look when they wake up! She would get so excited at the off chance it was actually true.

Two years earlier was such a simpler time. They would sit out on the patio, indulging in the ice cream parlors flavor of the day. In one particular memory, they would have their ice cream, but would not sit down with it.

It always baffled her when they acted odd like that. In their minds, they didn't like to sit because they had a bad habit of bending over, and the ice cream would often fall off of the cone.

Poor Jackson, he never understood why such simple yet wonderful things had to fall.

He would ask me why the Ice cream had to die, and as hard it is for a father, I had to tell him the truth.

He was probably too young to understand that dying was a part of living, but as he looked down at the splattered strawberry shortcake, he knew he could not live forever either.

Little Andrew would come over to him, and offer his cone out of pity. And as he bent down to hand it to him, the ice cream on his cone would join Jackson's on the ground.

All three of us would look in shock at the two runny red figures that laid parallel to each other.

Maybe they would cry for a moment, but they realized that it was ok to let them go.

There was more to live for then two fallen bodies.

If only I could get her to see it that way.

Victoria never really got over it, and who could blame her?

There on that same patio two years later, laid two bloody red figures. And in the distance I could hear Voltaire's voice mocking my efforts, reminding me that nothing in life is ever free.

* * *

This selection is an ongoing story about a superhero named Charlemagne. More will be added to this individual story over time, and more stories are being written about him.


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